NEWAYGO COUNTY, MI – Candace Wallis-Baumgartner, sister of a person of interest in the 2004 killing of 13-year-old Amanda Lankey, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of lying to police, reduced from two perjury charges.

But only one of the perjury charges was dismissed with prejudice, meaning the other could be re-instated. Newagyo County Circuit Judge Terrence Thomas ordered her to undergo a polygraph test on facets of the investigation.

The judge on Monday, March 17, also ordered Wallis-Baumgartner to spend 30 weekends in jail.

Prosecutors filed perjury charges against Wallis-Baumgartner, a former White Cloud police officer, in August 2012, and think she knows more about Lankey’s death than she’s let on.

Amanda LankeyFile photo

Her brother, Cecil Wallis Sr., committed suicide in 2011 after he was charged with criminal sexual conduct for alleged assaults against two teens a decade ago.

Prosecutors said Wallis-Baumgartner lied while being questioned in May 2012.

She allegedly refused to help an officer at the scene where the victim’s body was found in the Manistee National Forest.

She also was accused of falsifying a police report in the late 1990s for Cecil Wallis Sr. while she worked for the Mecosta County Sheriff’s Department. Authorities alleged she covered up a drunken-driving crash as a car-deer accident.